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Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights: A Concise Guide to the TRIPs Agreement
M. Blakeney
London, Sweet & Maxwell, 1996 xxii + 223 pp., 55.00 (hardback) ISBN 0421 53630 6
The Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (the TRIPs Agreement) is the most important international initiative in the field of intellectual property since the Paris Convention of 1883. The TRIPs Agreement sets down minimum standards and models for intellectual property rights, which draw on the Paris Convention and other conventions such as the Berne Convention, without slavishly incorporating them in their entirety. Additionally, the Agreement contains significant provisions for enforcement and, where members fail to comply with its provisions, mechanisms for dispute resolution. It is, therefore, welcome and timely to see a book devoted to this important agreement.
Michael Blakeney is Dean of the School of Law at Murdoch University in Australia. Nevertheless, the book is written from a perspective that is focused on the United Kingdom, although there is ample reference and comparison to laws in other jurisdictions, notably the United States, Australia, Japan and Korea. There is some mention of EC law in this field but there should be more, particularly as there are tensions between intellectual property law as it is evolving in the Community and the international conventions, notably the Berne Convention. These tensions may eventually filter through to the TRIPs Agreement. For example, whilst acknowledging the provisions for moral rights under the Berne Convention, TRIPs does not require members to comply with them. The book is divided into three main parts, these being a background and introduction to the TRIPs Agreement, the protection of specific intellectual property rights under it and the administration and enforcement of intellectual property under the agreement.
The first part describes the evolution of the TRIPs Agreement, followed by a fairly superficial description of intellectual property rights. International conventions protecting intellectual property are described, as are the various agencies and organizations administering the conventions. As might be anticipated, there is a detailed description of the developments leading to the establishment of the World Trade Organization (WTO). It is interesting to note that its creation almost seemed to be accidental-it was first mooted by the then Italian trade minister, Renato Ruggiero, but soon...